This study examines how discourses on family diversity have been represented in middle- and high-school Home Economics textbooks across successive national curriculum periods in Korea, from the Third National Curriculum to the 2022 Revised Curriculum. In the context of increasing social recognition of diverse family forms in Korean society, the study adopts a discourse-historical approach to explore how the concept of family has been categorized, what normative criteria have been used to define it, and how value judgments and justificatory logics surrounding family diversity have been constructed and transformed in educational texts over time. The findings reveal a gradual transformation in the representation of family in the textbooks. In earlier curriculum periods, textbooks tended to present the nuclear family as the normative and ideal family model while emphasizing its functional role in maintaining social order and supporting national development. In later curriculum periods, references to and discussions of a wider range of family types gradually expanded, reflecting social changes and the growing recognition of diverse family structures. Changes were also identified in the criteria used to define the concept of family. Earlier textbooks emphasized structural characteristics such as marital status and biological ties, whereas more recent textbooks place greater emphasis on the relational dimensions of family life, including affection, caregiving, communication, and conflict management.
Lee et al. (Sat,) studied this question.